July 25, 2017

Rasiklal Andharia: Classical Vocal [ECSD 2991] an LP recorded and released in India in 1985

There is not a lot of information about Rasiklal Andharia on the Internet. He seems to have been born in 1931 in Punjab and died around the time of this LP release, apparently of severe heart disease.

The only recordings of which I am aware are this one LP and also a CD on violinist Sangeeta Shankar's CD label Legendary Legacy Recordings entitled "Nirmal." There are several baithak and other recordings on youtube which I highly recommend.

Andharia appears to have been taught primarily by his uncle. Some of the rather scant biographies I found also mention the great Amir Khan; it is unclear whether there was actual teaching going on or if Andharia simply was influenced by the legendary maestro.

I have been holding on to these recordings for several weeks for the somewhat ridiculous reason that after completing the vinyl transfer process, I misplaced the physical LP and was waiting to find it in order to make the cover and label scans. Don't worry -- I'm sure the LP will turn up in my home office. Probably in a big stack of other LPs waiting to be transferred. In the meantime I will use the scans which I found on the singularly invaluable "Anthems for the Nation of Luobaniya" blog.

Either way, this is an extremely lovely LP. Andhari's vocal style is peaceful and beautiful. One gets the impression that he is simply singing the music without adding any unnecessary gymnastic embellishments. It takes quite a bit of artistic courage to adhere to such a simple style and make it work.

Even if you do not normally download vocal recordings, I sincerely suggest you investigate this.

5 comments:

Thank you so very much for your comment! I can't tell you how exciting it is to discover a recording by such an artist, who is so poorly represented on commercial recordings!

I looked up the catalog number on google and did find a few references to this (especially on an excellent EMI Indian Classical LP discography -- see link below).

It certainly appears to be a rare LP. Anything not listed on www.discogs.com means that it has never been listed for sale by any dealer who uses that site (and there are a lot of said dealers and collectors -- including, occasionally, me). I will definitely keep an eye out for it.

EMI Indian Classical music discography: http://discog.piezoelektric.org/hmvindia/index.php?prefix=eclp%2Fecsd&sort=title

!thank you so much for the latest shares. here is very short biography of Rasiklal Andharia from cds released by Meera Music label. i don't know the code for posting image in comments, so just a link to copied text:http://img10.lostpic.net/2017/07/27/d0ff0720aa4d398788d3aea328b78ef9.jpg

In effect, Meera Music released 8 CDs by the artist. In the West they can be obtained from info@raga-maqam-dastgah.com.His style is very close to Amir Khan. On the two LPs he nearly seems to copy Amir Khan. On the LP you posted he sings the same Ragas and even in one the same composition as Amir Khan on his very first LP (EALP 1253). On his first LP he also sings a Raga Amir Khan sang on his second LP: Raga Lalit, using also one of the compositions which Amir Khan sang.I have to say that I was and still am very fond of both LPs by Rasiklal Andharia. I might post the first LP if you don't find it.

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